The One With the Dirty Booze

Cam, like most fiances, has taken a backseat to me during the wedding planning. I don’t love or hate it, it’s just how it is. The things he has expressed interest in seem to be food and booze.

A few months ago, he was doing his usual random surfing the web at work and in one of the far corners of the internet where he likes to hang out, he found something that, in his words, “we just HAVE to do, okay?”

When asked what it was, he answered “we have to bury a bottle of bourbon in the yard.”

Uhh…I’m sorry, what? I’m not even the slightest bit a whiskey drinker, but even I don’t see the benefit in burying liquor in the yard. It’s not prohibition, and we’re not moonshiners.

He explained to me that in fact, there was a Southern tradition in which a bride and groom bury a bottle of bourbon at the ceremony site where they’ll be married, a month before the wedding. Allegedly, this prevents rain on your wedding day.

As silly as it sounds, anyone who’s been in the southeast this summer knows that we’ve had more rainy days than not, and I’m not taking any chances with my all outdoor wedding.

Here’s what one of my favorite Charleston wedding websites, Borrowed and Blue, has to say:

“Probably because so many Southern brides dream of an outdoor wedding in Charleston, & so of course fear of it being ruined, this Southern tradition is still going strong & is no doubt, hands-down, my favorite Southern wedding tradition. Southern folklore says if you bury a full bottle of bourbon upside down (so “they” say, these details matter) at your wedding venue exactly one month before your wedding day, you will keep rain away. The co-founders of Borrowed & Blue did it before wedding day &, as you can see, they had bright & sunny skies despite the threat of a hurricane. It can’t hurt to give it a try, & is an awesome event around which to center your engagement photos.”

I had to head down to Charleston to meet with the florist anyway, so Cam asked that I find out if we were even allowed to dig holes in the lawn of The Island House. The answer? A resounding “YES!” followed by this: “It hasn’t failed yet!”

Friday morning, bright and early, I was on the road, with Cam tagging along, bourbon in hand. In case you were wondering, he got a brand of bourbon called Trey Herring’s Carolina Bourbon Whiskey, which he bought specifically because it was made in North Charleston, SC. He said he didn’t want to piss off the “Bourbon Gods” by bringing in an “outside bourbon.”

I swear folks, the things Cam puts his energy into never cease to amaze me.

All Photos Personal

We pulled up to The Island House, which I haven’t seen since October when we booked the venue, and won’t see again until our rehearsal, and I remembered why we chose it. It was an overcast day, but I’ll let the space talk for itself:

True Confession: I had a nightmare that I fell down these steps while walking into my bridal processional. It might have been real enough to make me want to walk around from the front instead.

Hi, tent! See you soon!

One of the owners of the property, Paul, led us to the designated “bourbon burial spot,” and Cam asked me to document:

He was kind of bummed, I must say, because Paul dug the hole, and then covered the bourbon back up. When we got back in the car, he said “man, I wanted to use the shovel.” I told him he could dig a hole in the backyard and bury a Diet Coke can, if he was so inclined.

On our wedding day, after the ceremony, we (Cam) will dig it up and then we (Cam) will drink it!

We took a quick look around, saw some updates they had done in our absence, and then jumped back the car to drive three and a half hours home, because Cam’s bachelor party was starting at eight and he “needed me to make peanut butter brownies.”

Maybe I really am marrying an eight year old.

I must admit, I enjoyed this. It brought me a little closer to our Southern wedding, which feels nice since even though I’ve lived in the South for four and a half years, I still don’t feel particularly Southern. I probably never will, but I love that our wedding is!

Has anyone ever heard of this tradition before? Did you do it/did it work? Any other Southern traditions I should be on the look out for?

Anyway, a friend of mine did that and on their wedding day, a tornado and torrential downpours came. Just sayin’. Of course, this was in the mountains of New Hampshire, not the south, so maybe it will work for you! Good luck! 🙂